Royal Dental College

Background: Comprehensive assessment of the traits of teeth may be used as a differentiation tool between different races and sub-races.
 

Aim: The aim of the present study is to assess the distribution and types of Carabelli's trait in dental students.
 

Materials and methods: A total number of 160 individuals were clinically examined. Permanent maxillary first molars were examined for the expression of Carabelli’s trait. Dahlberg classification system was used to score the trait on the teeth. The teeth were examined by 2 observers independently to eliminate intra observer variation in interpretation.
 

Result: Cusp of Carabelli trait was expressed in among only 17% of the study group. Type 0 (133 cases, 83%) was most frequently expressed followed by Type 4 and 5 (5.6%), Type 6 was expressed in 3.75%, type 3 in 1.25% cases and type 1 only in 0.6% cases. Type 2 and type 7 were not expressed among individuals.

Conclusions: Cusp of Carabelli, a nonmetric dental crown feature may be used to develop a probabilistic model that will help in distinguishing individuals from specific human population particularly for forensic purposes.